• rwhitisissle@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    Man, you’re definitely spot on with this. For me, it’s a fast, easy source of superficial distraction that I can put on for background noise and don’t have to pay attention to. It’s ultimately what cable TV used to be for me. I’ll even leave on a streamer playing a game in the background on low volume if I’m going to sleep just for white noise. At this point, the behavior and desire for that kind of content is so ingrained in me that it’s sort of like an addiction. I wish there were alternatives to youtube, but that era of video content might just be straight up dying for some of us. I guess if anything I’ll start fleshing out my plex server with old t.v. shows and just put Gilligan’s Island or something on in the background.

    • Microplasticbrain@lemm.ee
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      5 months ago

      Yea, a plex server for idle viewing would be a way better alternative. Just make a custom nickelodeon, comedy central, etc and have it run random episodes of random shows.

      • Misk@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        I’ve actually always wanted to do this! Download a load of old school Nickelodeon stabs and episodes and find some software that can play them all together in random order haha… Any advice on how to go about setting this up?

        • rwhitisissle@lemmy.world
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          5 months ago

          It’s actually built into plex. If you have a library of t.v. shows you can just click the Shuffle button and it’ll play random episodes. Or you can make Categories of shows and shuffle those. If you’re asking how to get started with Plex and downloading content, well…I don’t want to get banned for piracy related reasons, so I’ll just say that, totally unrelated to this discussion, there’s a wealth of resources regarding how to get started with bittorrent and usenet. Which you can use for perfectly legal purposes, like downloading Liinux ISOs and open source textbooks.

          • Misk@lemmy.world
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            5 months ago

            Nah I’m good for Linux ISOs and open source textbooks, just wasn’t aware that some of these media players had a shuffle button 😝 thanks folks!

        • CileTheSane@lemmy.ca
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          5 months ago

          I use Jellyfin because it’s pretty light weight and straight forward. Just add the shows you want to a playlist, or even just specific seasons, and shuffle play.

    • Pretzilla@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Perfect opportunity to reprogram your brain. Put on something healthy like waves on the shore, etc.